


take it one step at a time

by VolxdoSioda



Series: Whumptober 2018 (Complete) [9]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Day 9 - Stranded, Gen, Whumptober
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-11
Updated: 2018-10-11
Packaged: 2019-07-29 11:03:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16262882
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VolxdoSioda/pseuds/VolxdoSioda
Summary: Noctis wakes up on Angelgard without a boat. The world may have gone to shit, but he still has a job to do.And it all starts with getting off this island.





	take it one step at a time

Angelgard is so quiet, compared to the rest of the world. But then, Noctis has spent the last ten years inside the Crystal, listening to the hum and flow of magic, the birth and death of... what did Bahamut call it? Providence? 

To be honest, his head is still a little fuzzy on all what he's been told - the sharpest thing that remains is the weight of the sacrifice doing all this will take. His death. 

In order for the rest of the world to be allowed to live, to wipe Ardyn out for good, he has to die. And that would be fine, he guesses, if... that had been the first go-to option given to him at birth. If his dad had been told 'stick a dagger in this baby or the entire world is going to die'. Hell, maybe he had been given that option. Maybe he'd ignored it, and that's why Noctis is suffering so much now.

Sweet Six, he can only imagine what Prompto, Ignis and Gladio have been up to since he's been gone. Are they still at the Keep? Are they dead? He's walked around the island, but found no way off - he had hoped maybe his dad's boat would still be around, but in hindsight it's a foolish wish to make. They went to Altissia, and Cid would have taken it back the same way, and parked it back at Caem. He wouldn't have gone to  _Angelgard_ and left it there for Noctis to use later. And that's assuming nobody else has taken it since then.

There's no sun, from what he's seen of the world beyond the black shores. No stars, either. No light at all, and the air is choked with something that almost looks like soot. Has Ravatogh erupted in his absence? But no, even that wouldn't cause this much darkness. There would have be  _some_ light. The Quay would at least be lit up.

But even from this distance, he can tell something is... off. Not what, precisely, but... there's something wrong with the shores beyond Angelgard.

_Think, Noctis. Before you left, the nights were getting longer, the days shorter, daemons more abundant. What does that mean, now, ten years down the line?_

Eternal night, for one. Which means daemons out in flocks, droves, constantly. So people would be heading for sources of daemon-repelling light, like Lestallum or Hammerhead. So that means Cid, Cindy, Takka and the others  _should_ be safe. 

 _But the Regalia was destroyed,_ he recalls.  _And the Keep was already a haven for daemons._

So there's a possibility his friends are dead, unless the Crystal truly can repel daemons. But that still leaves the issue of food, and water, and electricity. Inside might be safe, but only until they need to go  _out._

And speaking of out, that brings him back to his issue of getting off Angelgard. Because there's no boats, no trees, nothing he can use to build or create a way off -- and the swim is long. Very long. And Noctis has been in that Crystal for ten years. His body isn't exactly in its prime.

But he can't stay here. He has to go - make sure his friends are safe. There's no telling how long he'll tread water, how cold he'll be, what he'll encounter. In the darkness, there might be daemonic fish now, hungry for flesh.

Or maybe that's just his old nights with Prompto and horror games talking. Gods, he hopes Prompto is okay. 

Sitting here can only do so much too. So when it really comes down to it - he can either sit here and starve to death, or he can get in the water and try to swim for the Quay. 

It's really not much of an option at all. 

He remembers a long time ago, when them and Iris went into Malmalam thicket, and Prompto and him had screeched about cold water when they'd gotten splashed by the waterfall. Remembers the grin Gladio had shot them as he'd teased,  _"You should stand under that waterfall for a few hours and let it toughen you up."_ He wonders if he'd done that all those years ago would have made the coldness of  _this_ water easier to bear.

The first touch isn't just ice against his skin - it's so cold it feels like it's burning him. Searing through flesh, sneaking into every vulnerable crevice. He regrets it immediately, especially because the wind is howling, the not-soot still falling, the darkness of the waves making him feel completely isolated out here. He can barely see the Quay, far off in the distance. He kicks off, and forces himself to start swimming.

It's pure agony. For what feels like countless days he swims - paddles, kicks, floats on his back, dives, swims. He rotates moves as his body tires, floats on his back to regain some strength, but never long enough to let the waves push him off course.  Always he rolls back over and starts heading for the Quay. The cold eventually stops feeling so brutal, but he knows its there, and he knows getting out of the water will be far worse than getting in. He'll be lucky if he doesn't catch hypothermia by the time he makes it to the road.

It's only when he finally gets closer to the Quay that he amends that statement -  _if he gets to the road at all._

The world is full of daemons, but somehow Noctis didn't actually expect them to be walking around. But they're there, covering the beach and the destroyed ruins of the Quay, hundreds of them, all different sizes and species. Flans and Giants and Tonberries and Imps. Some are ones he's never seen before - like the one that's literally coming out of the walls. He can tell with a glance if he tries to fight that one, it'll kill him.

The old dock is broken down enough that Noctis can grab the chunks of wood and haul himself up. It hurts, and just as expected the cold stings worse coming out. It feels a little like he's dying, but he drags himself ashore, and for a moment, quietly lays there to catch his breath. To relish in the fact that he's alive, though for how much longer he can't say. 

And then just as quietly, he gets to his feet, and tries to get through the remains of the Quay while disturbing as few daemons as he can.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work out the way he hopes. Tonberries spot him, a trio of them, and they alert everything else. 

Noctis is one man against an army of daemons - outmatched, outmaneuvered, out of time. In this situation, he thinks back to Ignis, and decides discretion is the better part of valor.

He runs, letting the terror of the wails in the night fuel him as he scrambles up the road, dodging two more of the wall demons. He's terrified - if he has to walk all the way back to Hammerhead, it's going to be an absolute nightmare. There's no way he can keep running forever, not with his body as weak as it is. And eventually the daemons are going to be too fast, too many, for him to outrun. 

But at last, he gets a miracle. Maybe Bahamut is watching, and is tired of watching him flounder. Maybe his dad is watching, and just wants him to have hope. Or maybe someone was expecting him. Either way, when headlights round the corner and start for him, and the daemons edging closer scatter, all he can do is be grateful. He approaches the driver. 

"Prince Noctis, thank goodness you're alright."

"Uh... do I...?"

The young man tilts his head. "It's me, Talcott? I don't know if you'd remember me. Jared's grandson?"

_Talcott? Wait, the kid who loved cactuars? That Talcott?_

It almost isn't believable. But neither was waking up in Angelgard without a boat, and neither was swimming to the Quay. Neither is the world he exists in, if he really thinks on it. It isn't believable, but it's real. 

He gets in the truck, and from there it's a semi-quiet ride. And he finally gets confirmation that all of his brothers are alive - even if the world's gone to shit in his absence, at least he has them. 

 _Right up until the bitter end,_ he thinks.


End file.
